PRESIDENT'S REMARKS: ADAM KREMEN, PH.D.

As many of you are aware, the American Psychological Association is currently embroiled in a debate about its stance regarding the participation of psychologists in the interrogations of "detainees" or "enemy combatants" at Guantanamo Bay and other locations. The APA's leadership has delayed or refused to include unequivocal language in its Code of Ethics barring the involvement of psychologists in any aspect of interrogation or torture. Meanwhile the American Medical Association and the American Psychiatric Association have taken just such steps, further isolating the APA. For more background, I urge you to read last month's Washington Monthly article,Collective Unconscionable: How psychologists, the most liberal of professionals, abetted Bush's torture policy.

I'm well aware that many of you are not psychologists and so do not have to feel the embarrassment of your professional organization participating in such a shameful charade. Those of you who are APA members may want to consider writing in Steven J. Reisner, who is running as a single-issue candidate, on the nomination ballot for APA president. Further information on his candidacy, as well as a petition for a moratorium on psychologist involvement in U.S. detention centers for foreign detainees (for both APA members and nonmembers), is available here.

Closer to home, the Psychoanalytic Institute of Northern California presents a program this month entitled "Unfree Association: The Politics and Psychology of Torture in a Time of Terror." (See EVENT SPOTLIGHT for details.) I hope you will avail yourselves of these opportunities for involvement in this issue, which has such profound implications for the ethical underpinnings of our profession.